DAVID YOUNG has stirred up a hornets nest with a fired-up Leinster planning to ram his pre-season comments down his throat on Saturday night.

The Blues boss touched a raw nerve when he claimed Welsh teams no longer feared their Irish counterparts.

And his words have been picked up by rugby legend Brian O’Driscoll’s former Heineken Cup kings ahead of a huge Magners League clash at the Royal Dublin Society.

“As usual, the Welsh are talking themselves up,” declared Leinster assistant coach and former New Zealand international Jono Gibbes.

“Listen, he’s probably saying that on the back of the squad that he has got and he’s probably confident based on the results that are available to him.

“Obviously, the Ospreys came here and won last season. I guess, from his point of view, he’s making it into a very strong argument.”

The Ospreys clinched the Magners title with a clinical destruction of Leinster in the Irish capital five months ago in last season’s inaugural Grand Final.

Leinster are still hurting from that loss and how they threw a 10-point first-half lead away at Glasgow last weekend in their league opener.

Gibbes is expecting a response from his charges in front of a bumper crowd – nearly 15,000 tickets have already been sold – and warned the Blues, who disposed of Edinburgh, to expect a bruising battle.

“We want to just do our talking on the field,” he said, before conceding: “We know that we need to improve.

“I don’t think our defensive lineout was as strong as it was for the last two games so we need to sort that out because Paul Tito and those guys can get a pretty good platform off their lineout and we want to make sure (Casey) Laulala doesn’t have anything on a plate for him.

“Rugby is a confrontational game, it’s a physical battle and any time some team shows a little bit more want in that area is a disappointment. We have to make sure we are right there.”